


The Suspension

by hermitpanda



Series: Coffee & Pie [20]
Category: Criminal Minds
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-11
Updated: 2017-01-11
Packaged: 2018-09-16 20:58:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9289352
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hermitpanda/pseuds/hermitpanda
Summary: John smiled in an almost fatherly way. “It’s a beautiful yard. Did you design it?”“Spencer did with input from Jessica, my sister-in-law. He also designed the backyard with input from my son.”





	

**Author's Note:**

> Ready to find out how Aaron's coping with his suspension? Me too! Enjoy :D  
> ~* HermitPanda *~
> 
> Disclaimer: Don't own the Criminal Minds show or characters. Just borrowing them.

Aaron swiped his arm over his forehead trying to clear away the sweat. It didn’t help. It just smeared grime from his arm onto his face. Only one more butterfly bush then he could go inside to shower and eat lunch. He rolled his shoulders and started attacking the soil with his shovel.

 

The street was quiet during the day. In the three hours that he had been planting in the front yard, only one car had driven by.  He glanced up when he heard a car pull to a stop at his curb. He stuck the shovel into the dirt and waited patiently for the driver to step out of the car. His head jerked back slightly in shock when he saw John Evans approaching him. 

 

“Hello, Hotch. Did you do all of this?” the Assistant Director of the FBI gestured at the new landscaping. 

 

“Yes, Sir. It was just a big empty lawn. I laid the brick edging a couple days ago. Yesterday, I planted all the flowers up there by the porch and filled the flower boxes and pots. Today’s all the shrubbery. Tomorrow, I’ll aerate and fertilize the lawn. Then I’ll start working on the backyard. And I’m rambling. I’m sorry, Sir.” He held back a grimace. He wasn’t sure if he had picked up Spencer’s habit of rambling from spending too much time with the young genius or if it was a byproduct of missing him while he was gone to Oregon on a case.

 

John smiled in an almost fatherly way. “It’s a beautiful yard. Did you design it?”

 

“Spencer did with input from Jessica, my sister-in-law. He also designed the backyard with input from my son.” Hotch smiled fondly. It had taken weeks for the trio to figure out what the plans for the yards were.

 

“You didn’t get to plan your own yard?” The AD chuckled.

 

“No. My ideas weren’t good enough to get included according to Spencer.” Hotch shrugged then realized that he didn’t know why the other man was standing in his yard in the middle of the workday. “I’m sorry, Sir. Was there something that you needed to see me about?”

 

“Call me John. Sir is for at work. Do you prefer Hotch or Aaron at home?” He smiled.

 

“Either works. Only Spencer, Jessica, and Dave Rossi call me Aaron with any regularity anymore.” Aaron shrugged.

 

“I wanted to see how you were handling having so much time on your hands. I know how Spencer’s handling it.” John bent and smelled a flower on the bush Aaron had been digging a hole for.

 

Aaron gestured towards the porch. “We can go sit if you want.” 

 

John waved the suggestion away. “Go ahead and finish this and then we can. You are aware of my, let’s say, association with Spencer, correct?” 

 

“I believe I am. He’s never said your name. Just called you his sponsor.” Aaron focused on the shovel biting into the dirt. If his suspicions were wrong, he had just outed Spencer as an addict to a man who could ruin his career. If he was right, he was venturing into personal territory between the two men that he had no right to be in.

 

“He’s never said your name either. He has mentioned Jack by name. It was a slip of the tongue. He got so caught up in telling me about his first real family Christmas and that Jack had told him that he loves him that he didn’t even realize he had called him by name. I had had suspicions about your identity before that, but the knowledge that his boyfriend had a son named Jack and lived with the boy’s aunt made it very easy to confirm.” John watched him wrestle the bush into the hole.

 

Aaron grunted and dropped to his knees to smooth dirt over the roots of the freshly placed bush. “I’ve never asked him to keep our identities a secret from you. I knew he was talking to his sponsor about us. I assumed you knew our names.”

 

“Hm. So how are you handling all your free time?” John moved the hose closer to him when Hotch reached for it.

 

He waited to answer until he had watered the bush and sat back on his heels. “It’s torture. To know that my team is out there without me is enough to make me lose my mind. Morgan’s good at leading the team. I trust him. I trust the others. It’s just… hard.” He looked up at the man after his admission.

 

“And the fact that Spencer is there without you?”

 

“That’s the hardest. I know logically that Spencer doesn’t need me to keep him safe. He’s a great agent. Smart, capable, strong. But my heart aches that I’m not there to protect him.” Aaron could see why Spencer had bonded with his sponsor so well. Something about John coerced people talking to him to reveal more than they had intended to. He slowly stood and moved to the side so he could hose his arms off without the muddy water splattering on his visitor.

 

“This suspension is as much a punishment for Spencer as it is for you.” John nodded when Aaron looked at him. “Spencer doesn’t like change. He’ll go with the change in who his superior is because it’s a necessity, but for him, being in the field without your guidance and presence there, it’s tormenting him as much as it is you.”

 

“Did you intend it to be that way?” Aaron gestured towards the porch, and they crossed the yard to it. The pair of them sank into the chairs Jessica had insisted on placing out there. He held out a can of soda from his cooler in offering.

 

“Thank you.” John accepted and took a drink before answering the question. “Yes, I did. I know that you and Erin have struggled with each other for a while now. Perhaps I should have stepped in, but I didn’t feel I could unless you came to me. I suspected that you would feel that my unrequested interference was a slap at you and your capabilities.”

 

Aaron nodded thoughtfully. “Yes, I would have.”

 

“Both you and Spencer need to learn to trust other people. Oh, you trust your team, you trust your sister-in-law. You unquestioningly trust each other, but neither of you trusted me to help you. If you had, this suspension wouldn’t have happened.” John pinned Aaron with his gaze when he started to protest. “If Spencer had told me who you were back when he first told me he wanted to further develop a relationship with a friend, I could have made Rossi or Morgan his superior then and cleared the way so you didn’t have to hide. I knew he was hiding your identity from me. He’s an open book with me. He’s refreshingly candid when we talk. I knew from the very beginning that he was protecting his new boyfriend by not revealing his identity. I knew it had to be someone on the team, because why else would he go to such great lengths to keep me in the dark? He should have told me. As his sponsor, as his friend, as one of his superiors. He was protecting your career. I could have and would have willingly relieved him of that burden and protected you myself. It is in my power to do so.”

 

Aaron stared at his hands and bit back a sigh. “I never intended for Spencer to protect my career. I expected to carry that burden on my own.”

 

John nodded. “Oh, I know. You’re two of the most stubborn men I know of. If you, Aaron, had come to me early in the relationship, I could have bypassed Erin for the same outcome that we ended up getting to. Spencer with a different overseeing superior but still on the same team. But you didn’t.I don’t know if you saw it as a weakness to need help or were too scared that asking for help would leave you with a career in ruins. Either way, you and Spencer brought this suspension on yourselves by not being honest with me, not trusting me, not asking for my help.” 

 

“In hindsight, I can see several mistakes that we made,” Aaron admitted reluctantly.

 

“I want to help you. Because you’re both great agents with bright futures in the Bureau. Because I care about Spencer a great deal. Because I care about you as well because of your importance to Spencer. Don’t tie my hands like this again. You have to talk to me, Aaron. You have to trust me.” John peered at him over his soda can.

 

Aaron nodded. “I do, Sir. I’m sorry that you were put in the position you were by our not being upfront with you.”

 

“Good. I’ve already given Spencer this talk last night. Hopefully, it sinks in. Sometimes he’s rather hard-headed.” John smiled when Aaron chuckled and nodded. He stood up. “Right then, I shall leave you to the rest of your day. When Spencer gets back in town, I’ll call him to arrange for your family to join mine for a meal sometime. I have a granddaughter your son’s age. Perhaps they would be interested in playing together.”

 

“That would be nice. I look forward to the invitation. Thank you, John. For everything. Especially for being there for Spencer.” Hotch stood and extended his hand to the man.

 

John shook it, his left hand coming up to surround Aaron’s. He smiled warmly. “I look forward to seeing you more outside of the Bureau.” 

 

“Thank you, Sir. You as well.” Aaron smiled. He watched from the porch until John had pulled away before gathering his tools and going into the house.

  
  



End file.
